


Hurt and Haunt

by Asorae



Category: Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts (Video Games), kh - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, ugly kitchens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:01:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25025839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asorae/pseuds/Asorae
Summary: It’s hurts to be left, even more so to be left by choice.
Relationships: Axel & Roxas (Kingdom Hearts), Axel - Relationship, Axel/Roxas (Kingdom Hearts)
Kudos: 10





	Hurt and Haunt

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this on google docs on my phone over the course of a few weeks. It’s likely full of micro mistakes which I’m happy to edit out later, but o really wanted to post this as it’s my birthday today! Here’s a painful present from me to you. :)

Sometimes when Axel woke up, it was almost as if they had never happened.

His awakening would start as usual. The disorientation of his deep sleep was enough to blur the edges of his reality to a blissful haze, the sunlight streaming through the window created an aura that promised peace and preservation. That was until his sensibility returned, the world righted itself and he became acutely aware that he was alone.

Axel pushed himself up onto his elbows and looked around as the sun’s rays muted by the peony curtains lit up the room. Last night’s clothes were still in a heap on the designated chair adding to the gradually climbing pile of laundry, and the carpet was begging to be vacuumed. On the bedside table was an amalgamation of mugs, half drunk bottles and empty crushed cans that he kept telling himself he would clean up when he found the energy. It must have been early morning sunrise, or possibly the evening. He was never sure anymore. 

Still bleary eyed, Axel listened out for the sound of footsteps around the apartment he knew would never come. After a moment of silence he swung himself out of bed with a groan, pulled on some clothes that he deemed clean enough and made his way to the kitchen with one said dirty mugs in hand. The tiny kitchen with its overwhelming yellow tropical theme wallpaper and bisque flooring usually glowed a pleasant xanthous that welcomed him as he came through the apartment door, but lately it looked sickly and pallid, not unlike a mimic of Axel. What had normally felt homely with its kitschy styling now seemed tacky and over bearing, it almost made him feel anxious to be there, with its shocking pink sofa and neon lights pinned to the walls that made his eyes burn when the tears wouldn’t. He pushed aside the collection of pastel coloured dishes and sleepily began making himself a coffee in a pink bunny shaped mug, complete with ceramic ears and cottontail, its matching blue counterpart sitting dejectedly in the sink staring back at him with its cartoonish eyes. Axel glared back at it and thought about how good it would feel to launch it out his apartment window and watch it shatter into a thousand shards.

-

__

“There’s no way you’re having these in the apartment, Axel.”

“But they match the whole theme I’ve got going!” Axel countered, holding the two bunny mugs in front of him like a pair of trophies, grinning.

“That’s exactly why I hate it.” Roxas deadpanned, his eyes wide and almost grief stricken as Axel loaded them into the shopping cart. Axel looked up at him with a simplistic smile and Roxas couldn’t help but smile back, albeit whilst rolling his eyes. There was something so endearing about watching him beam over ugly kitchenware.

“I’m buying ‘em.”

-

Sat at the island counter which they’d shared many a study session, with his coffee in hand, he debated making himself something to eat but he wasn’t particularly eager to see what state he had left the fridge in from last time, even the thought of cooking left him feeling drained. Then again he was most definitely opposed to another night of cold and stale fast food from the night before. He missed waking up to the fragrant smell of chamomile tea and the sound of sourdough toast being buttered alongside that familiar soft voice he adored so much, singing along to their shared eighties inspired playlist that purred from the speaker. He missed those mornings. Axel missed mornings that he could look forward to. 

-

“So what's the deal?” Axel had asked, reaching across the table to pinch a piece of Roxas’ toast. The blonde didn’t notice, entirely engrossed in the laptop in front of him. “Roxas.” he stressed the last syllable to urge his demand for an answer to the question.

“Basically, when the company hired me I was pretty much a glorified secretary; I spent more time making people coffee than I did doing work.” Roxas sipped his own coffee from the bunny mug he claimed to hate. “But they’re transferring two supervisors to the agency in the city, and they want me to step up to cover their work.” This time he looked up from the laptop with a smile, his eyes alight with excitement. “Axel, it means I’ll practically be doubling my salary and I can actually afford to move down here.”

Axel dropped the toast and threw his arms up into the air in celebration, and shook his fists like he’d won a football match. “So you’ll be moving in for good?” he queried, arms still above his head in playfully mocking glory.

Roxas, who had been sipping on his blue rodent shaped mug at the time, choked on his gulp. Wiping the froth from his mouth with the back of his hand and setting down the drink, he smiled at Axel, who prepared for the negative.

“Axel, I’ve been living here for seven months. I think we’ve established that, don’t you?”

-

Glancing around the apartment that somehow felt bigger than it ever had, he wondered if he had always felt this empty when he had lived alone. The concept of owning his own apartment had thrilled him at first. Just having the keys in his hands was enough to fill him with that sense of pride. The apartment itself was nothing to brag about; the bedroom window never closed entirely which meant extra blankets, preferably an extra body, were an essential. Also the bathroom door sometimes swung open at inconvenient times if there was a draft which led to what Axel referred to as ‘an impromptu burlesque show’. But to him it was home, with its gaudy wallpaper he loved so much and charity shop furniture, complete with his tasteless collection of postcards they’d buy at seaside cafes and pictures depicting dogs playing poker. It should have felt spirited and lively, but the place had never felt more extinct.

He forced himself to shower, ignoring the shampoo bottles that specified that they were for blonde hair which he needed to throw away at some point, and threw on some clean clothes he’d found hidden next to the dryer. Axel needed to get out of the apartment before it threatened to suffocate him, so he grabbed his keys with their matching keychain that no longer had its counterpart and set off towards the coffee shop where they’d first met.

-

“Can I sit here?”

Axel didn’t bother to glance up as he mumbled a ‘sure’ under his breath, writing furiously in his notepad whilst simultaneously glancing at the laptop in front of him, jotting down annotations in the margins of his page. Desperation and procrastination often came hand in hand, and here he was using the free coffee shop wifi watching a secretly recorded lecture he had never bothered to attend with its atrocious audio quality that dipped in and out mockingly when he needed it most. Sure, he could have just attended the lecture. But then again he could’ve done a lot of things. 

Axel tutted as the audio dissipated again and swore to himself he would never miss class again. He was smart, but disciplined wasn’t his moniker.

“Is that Professor Vexen’s lecture?”

Axel looked up to find the face of what could only be described as purely handsome. The young man sat opposite him was blessed with possibly the bluest eyes he’d ever seen, defined by impossibly black eyelashes and tresses of champagne hair. His skin was fair, cheeks dappled with freckles and the tip of his nose a rosey pink from the cold outside. Dressed in black cargo pants and shirt, punctuated with a white belt and watch with two rings to match, but none of that could distract Axel from the soft curl of a smile on the perfectly constructed face on the man in front of him.. He was holding out a notebook on an open page of perfectly written paragraphs, complete with a summary and a title outlined in blue highlighter. If Axel had sat next to this boy in his lecture he would’ve noticed. He took the notebook without taking his eyes off of him.

“Th-thanks. Thank you. Yes.” 

Way to be articulate and totally coherent Axel, he thought, mentally kicking himself for failing to talk like a normal human being.

-

It was late afternoon by the time he’d walked into their favourite coffee shop. Their home away from home, the coffeehouse was their go to for almost any reason. Whether it was meeting up before class, a lunch break with a shared platter of pastries with Axel saving the strawberry bakewells for Roxas as they were his personal favourite, then finally grabbing a hot chocolate to wind down after a long day in school before they walked back to the apartment. It was where they remained until late to submit those last pieces of work, side by side on the tan leather sofa as they slaved over essays that felt never ending. It was also where they’d gone to celebrate Roxas’ promotion with enough strawberry bakeswells to sink a ship. As Axel entered the familiar bell over the door announced his arrival with a soft chime, the combined smell of cinnamon and caramel drifted through the air and the yellow flare of the candles around the shop greeted him, flickering in the breeze he let in with his entrance. The owner clocked his arrival and began the prep for his go to drink.

As the hot chocolate was placed in front of him Axel observed just how empty the table looked with his single drink minus its twin and assortment of sweets lacking. He almost felt embarrassed to be seen unaccompanied in the shop. As a stab of loneliness cracked at his chest like an ice pick, he sighed painfully and sat back into the cushions, his heart heavy. He closed his eyes that had quickly begun to sting and tried to pretend they weren't. Suddenly the smooth jazz over the speakers seemed to depress him as opposed to soothe him and the sweet smell of sugar and syrups felt sickly in the back of his throat. That once warm, welcoming amber glow of the shop that used to relax him now felt loud and garish. Everything was suddenly too much and he wondered why he’d come here in the first place. For the memories? Just for old times sake? It had been his happy place. Their happy place. Now it felt like an empty vault of what had once been, the realisation that this was no longer his home away from home was unbearable and Axel knew he never should have come here.  
He almost wanted to laugh. How stupid to revisit the one place they had shared together, like some sort of stalker retracing their victims steps to get a hint of their presence, a bad smell lingering over the decomposing remains of their alliance. 

-

“I thought the whole point of this was to be closer to one another.”

Roxas shifted his weight uncomfortably, fiddling with the matched keychain Axel had bought him on his birthday. Axel knew something was wrong when he had asked to ‘have a talk’; he knew it was something disastrous when he hadn’t even sat down next to him, watching as Roxas’ eyes darted around the room uneasily, refusing to even glance at him for a second. Axel sat motionless on the sofa, his own eyes trained on Roxas like a hawk, daring him to speak and praying it wasn’t what he already knew he was going to hear. 

“It’s the job I’ve always wanted, Ax. It’s the whole reason I moved here. It’s the whole reason I went to school in the fir-”

“So that’s it?” Axel spat out the question like venom. He knew it wasn’t Roxas’ intention to be cruel yet his knee-jerk reaction was to give out the hurt he so vehemently felt. Maybe it would make him feel better. Or make Roxas feel worse. Maybe that’s what would make him feel better; if he could make Roxas feel as hurt as he did, he would feel less bitter, less like he was being discarded.

“I didn’t think it would happen this fast.” Roxas whispered, his voice barely audible even in the deadly silence of the room. He looked down at the keychain and gripped it in his shaky fist. ”I didn’t think it would end.” Axel could hear the shift in his tone of voice that threatened tears and suddenly the thought of ever hurting Roxas filled him with a guilt like he’d never known. Roxas had never meant to break Axel’s heart, but then again Axel had never meant to fall in love with him.

-

He drained the hot chocolate, ignoring that scalding feeling it left in his throat and the ever familiar sting in his eyes returned. Dishing out the cash for the drink and tossing it onto the coffee table he donned his jacket and bolted out the shop with his vision suddenly blurred by hot, angry tears. Axel pulled the lapels of his jacket up to hide his face and stormed down the streets in a flurry of anguish and sorrow, not sure if he wanted to ignore the feeling or relish in it. There was something freeing in welcoming the emotions that begam to engulf him, like gazing into a fire with the deviant desire to put one's hand into the flame. As he turned the corner that led to his block, wind whipping at his cheeks and turning them red, Axel let a sob escape the back of his throat and the tears began to crystalize in the corners of his eyes. 

Slamming the door to his apartment, the tears that had threatened to appear for months but never arrived burst from him like a flood. He sank to the floor with his back pressed against the doorframe, painfully whimpering into his hands, keychain in hand digging into his palm as he balled his fists in frustration. There was something so unfair about being left, he thought to himself. Something between shame and distress, the feeling of not being good enough for him to stay. He didn’t know it would hurt this much. Axel squeezed his hands together in annoyance and felt the key bite into his skin.The keychain without its matching pair was the painful reminder that Roxas was never coming back, and that not only that, it was by choice. With a cry of anger and resentment he launched the keys across the room where they met the wall with a clang before falling down the back of the sofa. He sat in his shameful pity party for a moment, staring at the wall where the keys had impacted and pushed away the remaining tears with the back of his hand, sniffling into his sleeve. How stupid he’d been to go there again, to try and relive those memories, haunting their old hangout and pretend he was well-adjusted to the feeling of being abandoned. Axel squeezed his eyes closed and tried to get his breathing back to normal although the occasional sob still came. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitting there but he could feel the cold of the tiles on his behind and the chill made him feel sick. He dragged himself off of the floor and rubbed his face, groaning. Sluggishly he trudged into the bedroom, kicked off his shoes and collapsed onto the bed as the impromptu crying session had made him listless and lethargic. He also didn’t feel hungry and couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten. It never seemed to matter anymore.

As the sun set outside his window and the darkness grew around his bedroom, he was finally tired enough to close his eyes and grieve in his silence. Axel tucked his knees up into his chest, stared at the wall and did what he always did before he fell asleep; think about Roxas.


End file.
